Oh my goodness I was shattered last week. On Monday my hire car (Masda again) turned up and I drove to Lee-on-Solent ready for an all day meeting the next day. This is very much a new thing for me, until six months ago if I had an all day meeting I'd set off at about 06:00 and drive 3 hours, have the all day meeting and then drive home.
I've had to recognise that those days are gone for me. Basically if I try to do that I'll never make it through the day. So I'm now booking a hotel for the night before, then driving home after the meeting. It certainly helps a bit, but it does mean that I lose 1.5 days instead of just one. And I never seem to be able to pack correctly.
Before COVID I'd be in a hotel every Wednesday. I was actually very organised and had 2 sets of everything. For example, one toothbrush for home, one for travel, one set of make-up for home, one for travel, one set of toiletries for home, another for travel etc. etc. This mean that to pack for my Wednesday night away all I needed to do was to shove a suit and something to sleep in into my suitcase and I knew I'd have all I needed. I even kept my laptop and notebooks etc. in a wheeled suitcase I called in my portable office. This meant I didn't even have to think about that either.
However, now I work from home my trips away are more sporadic and somehow packing gets hugely complicated and I end up with enough stuff to go away for a week, but am always missing the thing I need! My recent favourite was a bra, where one of the pads had come out in the wash and I hadn't noticed so I ended up having to stuff the bra cup with loo roll for the day! FOXY.
I'm never great in January or February - always shattered, and let's face it with ear problems, dad's driving, son's blood tests, plus lots on at work January was pretty shattering anyway. So before I even set off to Lee-on-Solent I was a puddle.
Over the weekend our back door had broken once and for all, so before I headed off as well as doing a day's work I needed to sort somebody out to fix it. The person on the phone said 'we don't do it here, I need to pass it on and they'll get back to you, it can take up to a fortnight'. I said 'Can't you tell them I'm a frail little old lady and my back door isn't working or locking properly and I'm awake at night in fear of my life'. Person on the phone said 'You could, but everybody tries that one, it's just that they don't tend to be so obvious about it'. However it did work, because he said to stay on the phone, within 10 minutes I had an appointment booked for somebody to come on the Friday.
Arriving back on Tuesday evening I was even more shattered - though relieved that once again I'd managed to look after my hire car. I do like the Mazda. On the way back I needed to fill up the car with petrol. I was nervous about this. The spacious petrol station was annoyingly closed, this meant that I was going to have to squeeze the car into another petrol station close to home that's difficult to even get my mini into. So I drove to it and concentrated really hard on not hurting the car and making sure the petrol cap was in the right place. SUCCESS. I went into the petrol station to pay - the woman looked at me as if I was very odd - I looked back - she said 'You haven't actually put any petrol in your car!'.
I'd been concentrating so hard on my mission to get the car in safely and on the right side of the pump my brain had just registered a successful interaction! Needless to say I then went to fill up my car with petrol.
On Wednesday we had tickets to Rob Beckett, with the travel to Lee-on-Solent and the travel home, this meant it was effectively the third night in a row I had been out. There wasn't a bone in my body that wanted to go out of the front door. But I tarted myself up (a little bit) and then husband and I headed into Brighton to go to the Dome. I hadn't known if I'd like Rob Beckett's standup. I like his podcast and I like the stuff on telly, but had never seen the stand-up. I'll be honest, for me it was ok. I couldn't relate to all of the things that he talked about, which is always tricky for me. But I don't want to go in two footed, because I was so tired it could easily have been frame of mind. By the end I had my chin in both hands just to hold my head up straight and not fall asleep. Again, this is not a reflection on Rob Beckett, just how tired I was.
Thursday was uneventful and I managed to get to sleep a little bit early, but not early enough. On Friday morning I needed a power nap before I could even start work!!!!!!! During the day somebody came in to fix the back door, which is a blessing. The main thing it's used for is to let the dog out to wee, if we let her out the front of the house she chases people down the road - or runs after foxes or cats. We do have french doors at the back, but they haven't worked properly for years. And that takes me to the final bit of Friday. Once I finished work somebody came around to quote for new french doors at the back. The first price was so high it made my eyes water. They asked what price I was hoping for, I said £300 - I don't think that's the type of negotiation they are used to.
Anyway, by the time they'd played around with 'this discount' and 'that discount' we were only about £200 higher than the figure I'd decided I was prepared to pay. So we've signed for those and I'm actually excited to get it sorted.
Then that was it really, I was so shattered by this point, the only thing I did at the weekend was sleep and cook supper. I'm still shattered though.
On a positive note. This morning I took dog out for it's walk and we were on the field at 07:00 - it was already turning light (see photo). It's where all the seagulls sleep in case you're wondering what the things are in the background. My super cheap mobile phone isn't great at night time pictures and I can't be bothered to read the manual to find out how to sort it out.
Tomorrow I'll leave 5 minutes earlier. But that's encroaching on what I may or may not have to say next week. So I'll wrap up here.
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